Gas 2.0

In an attempt to “allow even more people to experience what the Tesla Roadster has to offer” and to get ready for the “springtime Roadster rush,” Tesla has just announced a brand new lease option for the already iconic electric car.

The lease will run for 3 years/30,000 miles, includes access to Tesla’s Rangers mobile service team, and starts at $1,658 per month for the base model. Of course, you also have to plunk down $12,453 just to get the lease started. Wow! Let me just sell my house and I’ll be right over.

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Like many guys, when I was about 13 or 14 I was into drawing the cars of the future. To my hormonal and inexperienced cauldron of a prepubescent brain, the cars I drew were clearly superior to the dull people-movers that adults seemed to appreciate. But in reality, the cars I imagined we’d all be driving when I got to be 30 looked more like they plopped right out of an episode of Robotech than something anyone other than a prepubescent teenager could take seriously.

Which is why, when I saw the pics for Honda’s newly unveiled 3R-C EV, I thought, “Wow! That is something my 13 year old self would have thought was totally wicked!”

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Last year I was a little taken aback when Koenigsegg teamed up with NLV Solar to showcase the Quant at the Geneva car show. While some Koenigsegg supercars supported biofuels (and actually made more horsepower on them), they never struck me as much of a green company. The car they designed was definitely influenced by their line of supercars.

Well the Quant has returned to Geneva in 2010, and is more than just a pretty concept sitting on a pedestal. Though their current relationship with Koenigsegg is unclear, NLV says they should have a running prototype up this year, with a full production model slated for 2012.

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The surprise US victory over Team Canada in the mens’ ice hockey game brought back many memories of the 1980 “Miracle on Ice” at the Lake Placid games. It also happened to be the 30th anniversary of that game. As a hockey fan and devout goalie (yes, I let people shoot pucks at my head) I was ecstatic at the victory.

What I was not so happy about was the apparent failure of three Olympia electric ice machines last Monday. Touted as a green solution to ice resurfacing, one machine after another broke, prompting officials to bring in the good, old fashioned, American-made, and fossil-fuel powered Zamboni ice resurfacers.

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Waaaay back in the yesteryear of 2008, AMP (Advanced Mechanical Products) announced that they would begin performing electric car conversions on the GM Kappa cars. A lot has changed in the past year and a half.  The Kappa cars, the Saturn Sky and Pontiac Solstice, are as dead as their respective brands. But AMP is still proceeding with its conversion plans, and has signed “a letter of intent for a potential long‐term electric motor supply agreement” with Remy International.

So does that mean we can have our electric Kappa cars soon?

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Snail mail is getting a big push from Congress to go electric and I’m not talking about e-mail. The United States Postal Service (USPS) wants to electrify its fleet and Zap motors might just to do the trick. This week, the California-based company announced they are engineering an all-electric truck prototype for the mail delivery service.

Full details are still unclear but U.S. Congresswoman Lynn Woolsey will tour the Zap EV facility next week “to learn more about how this federal program is creating local jobs.” The truck will not be the Xebra pictured above but a “conversion of a gasoline postal truck to run on electricity.” Read the rest of this entry »

According to reports, three mid-level engineers for Tesla Motors have died in a fiery plane crash over Palo Alto, CA, this morning. Although names have not officially been released yet, witnesses say that the plane was owned by Doug Bourn, a senior electrical engineer for Tesla. Apparently the plane crashed right in to a residential neighborhood on top of a daycare facility. No other injuries have been reported, although some houses have been damaged.

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While I was grumbling about the dearth of green automobiles and related green happenings at last week’s Chicago Auto Show, Ford—who stole the show with the most exciting green car announcements including a natural gas Transit Connect Taxi and a 30 MPG Ford Edge—provided me with an opportunity to be one of the first of the media to drive the upcoming Transit Connect Electric.

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It’s been a whirlwind of a three month tour for the upcoming Nissan LEAF electric car. After kicking things off last November in Los Angeles, the LEAF and its accompanying drivable test mule made 63 stops in 24 cities, finally ending up at an appearance in New York City last week.

Nissan says the tour covered 10,000 miles and gave more than 100,000 people the ability to see and learn about the car–and electric vehicles in general.

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Last month we came across the Trexa, an old idea with some new life breathed into it. The old idea was to use a self-contained “skateboard” as a vehicle chassis which included all the components necessary for propulsion. The skateboard could then use interchangeable bodies, or customers could design their own. It takes the idea of car ownership to a whole new level.

But what about the price? Surely something so savvy, eco-friendly, and customizable would cost a pretty penny. Well Trexa seems to be bucking conventions, because the whole self-contained skateboard can supposedly be had for $15,999.

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There are times when our elected representatives are blinded by a stunning flash of light and realise The Truth of something Common Sense has told the rest of us forever.

Sadly that moment hasn’t yet arrived. But it may be drawing closer, inch by painful inch.

A new report, commissioned by Greenpeace, Friends of the Earth and Transport and Environment, has listed six policy changes which the EU should make in order to ensure we’re “harvesting the climate potential of electric vehicles.” Yeah, whatever.

And although these are aimed squarely at the EU, they’re worth paying attention to as they could make a great blueprint for the US and other countries to work from.

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Electric cars and the cold generally do not go well together because of the whole depleted range thing. That is, unless, you’re racing.

This past December the Andros Electric Trophy racing series began. Featuring eight AC 03 Evo2 electric cars built specifically for this series, the race challenged drivers to take their electric rides around seven different icy, snowy courses. The winner was Nicolas Prost, son of four-time F1 champion Alain Prost. No surprise there!

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Just ahead of their official launch at the 2010 Chicago Auto Show, Ford has released more details on the upcoming all-electric and natural gas versions of their popular commercial fleet and utility van, the Transit Connect.

Since its U.S. introduction at the 2008 Chicago Auto Show, the Transit Connect has garnered significant praise from the media for its fuel efficiency and versatility. In fact, just last month the Transit won the 2010 North American Truck of the Year honors at the Detroit Auto Show.

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For many years, electric cars didn’t look so much like cars, as they did… well… they didn’t much look like anything anyone would want to drive. I never understood half-covering the rear-wheels (that has never been cool) or the funky lines and shapes electric cars inevitably filled out. And so, in recent years, electric cars have begun to look more like… well… cars. Whether or not this is a good thing is up to you, but Protoscar apparently thinks electric cars should look funky.

Hence the undramatic unveiling of the Protoscar Lampo 2. An awkward name for an awkward car that actually has some impressive features, like a ten-minute charge good for about 60 miles and a 0-62 mph time of under 5 seconds.

So why the horrid name?

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Last summer Chicago upped the ante on next generation EV charging stations with the nation’s first solar powered one, and now they’ve done it again, but this time with wind. For a town known as the windy city, it only seems to make sense, but how they decided to go after solar before wind is beyond me.

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